Estimates of the exposed dermal surface area of Chinese in view of human health risk assessment

The given paper is inclined to introduce its authors' research on the relation between the dermal exposure area and the health risk assessment as a result of dermal exposure,such of contaminated sites,which has been initiated in the environmental management departments concerned in our country.To begin with,we have borrowed and quoted some of such parameters originated in the US and Europe in this line.As is known,it is very common for human beings to expose their dermal surfaces to the outside in a variety of activities,such as washing, swimming,open-field working and/or dancing or special feats-performances,which may lead to different degrees of skin contamination.Since it is relatively difficult to make statistics and measurement of dermal surface area,the Chinese researchers used to adopt data on the dermal surface area of foreigners when they estimated the dermal exposure dose in the health risk assessment for us Chinese.This may result in the errors due to the differences in the body size between Chinese and the foreigners.The objective of this paper is to provide estimate in this way with the data of the body size of Chinese,including height and weight.For this purpose,we have collected the data of Chinese in this way and estimated the dermal surface area with the whole body and various body parts by using the models of Gehan and George,Haycock et al,and USEPA.Results of our estimates indicate that the average dermal areas of Chinese adult male and female were 1.69 m2 and 1.53 m2,respectively,which are lower than those of American counterparts by 13% and 10%.The average dermal areas of Chinese 2-12 old males and females were 0.84-0.91 m2 and 0.82-0.89 m2,respectively, while they are 1.48-1.57 m2 and 1.42-1.47 m2 for 12-20 old males and females.Therefore,the average dermal area of Chinese is generally lower than those of the Americans.In addition,the average dermal area of Chinese urban male and female is generally higher than those of Chinese in the countryside.It is such suggested that the parameter values of Chinese in their dermal surface exposure should be used in doing their health risk assessment in our country.